And two that got away
January of 1998, Tamworth pigs were being unloaded at a slaughterhouse in Wiltshire, when two shot off to one side, wriggled through a hole in the fence and escaped into the wild. The Tamworth Two became a sensation. No, really.
It was the most important story of the week – by far […] It had become impossible to avoid the story. A contributor to Radio 4’s Thought for the Day mused over them; the editor of The Independent, Andrew Marr, wrote about them in his letter to the readers. They even featured in an editorial in The Guardian.
Almost 100 reporters from all over the world turned up. The Times got the story going, but the Daily Mail (in true Daily Mail fashion) played it like a fiddle. They put some muscle into it, naming the pigs Butch and Sundance (they were sister and brother, but w/e) and sending their best out pig catching.
The two were located in someone’s back garden after a week of freedom and eventually captured, Sundance first and then Butch. None the worse for wear. The Mail bought them for an undisclosed sum and they lived out their lives in the Ashford Rare Breeds Centre.
Yes, the picture is posed by pig actors. They made a made for TV movie about it.
Turns out one or both of them had a wild boar for a daddy, so there’s that.
So. I do understand this, but I am embarrassed. I am embarrassed to admit I posted a tribute to my dead chicken yesterday and then tucked into a bowl of Chinese chicken and rice. One day, mark my words, I’ll end up a vegetarian. Or dead at the bottom of a huge karma pile.
Posted: March 21st, 2017 under animals, britain, personal.
Comments: 15
Comments
Comment from Steve Skubinna
Time: March 21, 2017, 9:08 pm
All of a sudden I’m beginning to “get” stories like The Wind in the Willows, or Watership Down, or Winnie the Pooh as a uniquely British literary type.
Comment from Timbo
Time: March 21, 2017, 10:10 pm
Karma pile for me then. Couldn’t imagine a future without bacon. Or steaks. Or chicken.
Comment from S. Weasel
Time: March 21, 2017, 10:16 pm
Oh, for sure, Steve. These people and their animals.
On the other hand, they also used to (and still do) things like badger baiting and cock fighting, so it’s not QUITE that simple.
I know, Timbo. I know. There was this one day in my twenties when I stared down at a steak before I put it on and thought, “tissue sample.” I went veg for about a week after that.
I have to do a whole lot of not thinking about it sometimes, though.
Comment from QuasiModo
Time: March 21, 2017, 10:46 pm
If G*d didn’t mean for us to eat animals, he wouldn’t have made them out of food :+)
Comment from Ric Fan
Time: March 21, 2017, 11:01 pm
Colin Dexter, 86 y/o, creator of Inspector Morse, has died. RIP, Mr. Dexter!
Comment from S. Weasel
Time: March 21, 2017, 11:03 pm
I saw, Ric Fan. It was a pretty good series, that, though I haven’t watched a whole lot of it. Oddly enough, Facebook asked me to join and Inspector Morse fan group two days ago.
Comment from Pupster
Time: March 21, 2017, 11:14 pm
Is this you, Stoaty?
Comment from durnedyankee
Time: March 21, 2017, 11:36 pm
I myself am a member of P(eople) E(ating) T(asty) A(nimals)
I have 2 dogs, and a cat, and they are members of
Pets Eating Tasty Animals (and carrots, no one weeps for carrots).
Comment from Uncle Al
Time: March 22, 2017, 3:31 am
Not to worry about karma. I was irrevocably and brutally put off of the whole idea of karma by may late friend Robert when he pointed out that if karma were real then Jews, Gypsies, and “degenerates” had done something to deserve Nazi death camps.
I’ll have the chicken with lemon and tarragon, please. Hold the karma.
Comment from Wolfus Aurelius
Time: March 22, 2017, 1:34 pm
Comment from Steve Skubinna
Time: March 21, 2017, 9:08 pm
All of a sudden I’m beginning to “get” stories like The Wind in the Willows, or Watership Down, or Winnie the Pooh as a uniquely British literary type.
*
*
Ah, Watership Down. When I tell people it’s a British thriller with rabbits, they don’t believe me. I read it as a grownup, about age 26. The run-up to the climax grabbed me so hard, I skipped watching that evening’s episode of M*A*S*H, and I was a BIG fan of that.
“Bigwig? BIGWIG!”
“Silflay hraka, u embleer rah!”
Comment from Ric Fan
Time: March 22, 2017, 4:29 pm
I guess the tongue bathing of Martin McGuinness will have to be suspended while we are repeatedly lectured that the bodies all over the bridge and in Parliament are not terrorism. 🙁
Comment from bad cat robot
Time: March 22, 2017, 4:48 pm
Didn’t Violence do her level best to chow down on you? Besides, in some cultures it is considered polite and respectful to ingest an honored foe, to thus obtain their fighting spirit. Bon appetite, I say.
Comment from durnedyankee
Time: March 22, 2017, 6:27 pm
And here I didn’t dare ask if Violet might be Chinese.
Comment from S. Weasel
Time: March 22, 2017, 8:25 pm
Ew. I don’t think it’s wise to eat something that died of an unknown lurgie.
Comment from durnedyankee
Time: March 22, 2017, 8:45 pm
Seriously, if it were me having to do it, I’d be a vegetarian, I know it. I have the killer instincts of a coffee cup.
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